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David Benqué's Acoustic Botany

The debate around Genetic Engineering is currently centered around vital issues such as food, healthcare and the environment. However, we have been shaping nature for thousands of years, not only to suit our needs, but our most irrational desires. Beautiful flowers, mind altering weeds and crabs shaped like human faces all thrive on these desires, giving them an evolutionary advantage. By presenting a fantastical acoustic garden, a controlled ecosystem of entertainment, I aim to explore our cultural and aesthetic relationship to nature, and to question its future in the age of Synthetic Biology.

"Desired traits such as volume, timbre and harmony are acquired through selective breeding techniques."

"Grafting, an age old practice (since at least 2000 BC.), is used to create harmonic notes combinations on a single tree."